Promises To Keep
by XxBlaiddxX
Summary: Post Series: Vash comes back. Not very descriptive? Well, read it yourself. : Lots of Vash/Meryl- 'cause they're just so dang cute! Rated T for just in case. :
1. A Figure in the Distance

So...very very exciting! This is actually my first Trigun fic, and I'm oh-so proud of it! Please, tell me what you think. I would really appreciate it. :D

*********

It was very hot. That would, of course, be stating the _painfully_ obvious.

A dry wind blew across the desert, blowing a fine layer of sand over the lonely, nameless town. Tavern doors rattled and a few stray men scurried out and home to their significant others, but more importantly to escape the heat of the crowded bar.

Someone's forgotten Thomas lay dead in the street, another victim of the heat.

Several iles out of town, from the shimmering desert, came a faint tune. A man, singing. His voice was hoarse from lack of water, and his words came out uneven from his labored breathing...but the emotion of the song he sang overcame that. He sung it softly, but the conviction of his voice would have made anyone who happened to hear stop and turn their head.

"So... On the first evening

a pebble from somewhere out of nowhere drops upon the dreaming world."

He trudged on, the burden on his back forcing him to walk slower than he would normally.

"So....On the second celestial evening, all the children of the pebble join hands and compose a waltz."

He stopped and panted, wiping the sweat from his face with one of his gloved hands.

How strange that song sounded when he sang it! She had sung it so much better... They were beautiful, _powerful _words when she sang them..

A single drop of blood dripped onto the sand below him. He winced, not particularly wanting to know whether it was his own or his brother's. Just the sight of blood made in want to throw up, he'd seen plenty of it recently.

He trembled and choked back the bile building in his throat.

"S-s-sound Life!"

He took a deep breath and started walking again, his voice raising to counter the harsh wind that was stirring up the sand.

"So... On the third night,

The children of the waltz cause ripples on the face of the world!"

He noticed in the distance a brown streak of a town. Never had he been so happy to see any sort of civilization. He had walked iles and iles to get this far, and he was finally there. Well, almost.

Taking care not to hurt him more than he had to, he gently laid his brother on the sandy ground before joining him. Time for one last rest before the final push.

He looked at his twin lying there so peacefully beside him, his chest going in and out. He looked human. Peaceful. One would never know to look at him that he had nearly brought about the end of humanity countless times....

Sometimes he wondered why he went through so much trouble to spare his sibling.

He looked towards the town in the distance. How he hoped there were at least two someone's there who cared very much about him.

******

The petite girl with short, raven hair sat on the porch swing. She was thankful that the wind had died down. No sand blew in her face now, but she wished that there was a least a slight breeze. She'd completely taken off her derringer cloak, and wore her half-sleeved undershirt. Gone were her leggings, over-shirt, and boots.

The heat was beginning to get to her now.

A fly landed on her nose. Her first thought was to get it off as soon as possible. But an ordinary house fly was very interesting at this point of view, and she found if she just crossed her eyes a certain way and squinted she could see every deta-

"SEMPAI!!"

Meryl Stryfe sat bolt up right, fascinating fly _long_ forgotten, and shouted loudly,

"MILLY!"

"Oh...did I scare you, Sempai?" Milly's ever-growing smile asked.

"No, Milly," Meryl asked behind cupped hands. "I'm just ever-so-fond of screaming your name."

"Oh! Ok then." Milly continued to beam

"Well??"

"What?"

"What did you want, for crying out loud?!"

"Oh, nothing really. I was just going to the store, and I wondered if you needed anything, or wanted to go! I didn't know where you were."

"Well, I'm right here," Meryl said, feeling a little ashamed for snapping at Milly, even if her friend didn't even notice. "And no, I don't want to go. It's too hot to move, let alone carry groceries."

"Ok, Sempai. I just wanted to let you know. Have a nice afternoon!" Milly tripped down the front steps, perkier than ever.

Meryl gazed out into the shimmery desert, looking for any signs of life. It's what she'd been doing since the day Vash left. Even though it had only been two weeks, she was beginning to lose hope. Not to mention her temper and will to go on.

"Please come back, Vash," She whispered, gently rocking back and forth on the swing. It had become her mantra for the past two weeks. She squeezed her eyes shut as little tears escaped from the corners. "I can't take this anymore. I can't take the constant disappearance...I can't take tracking you down. I can't take _losing _you again. Not again." She was of course referring to the two years while everyone thought Vash to be dead. She hadn't realized how much she had actually _cared _about that big goof-ball with the spikey hair, who really only called her 'Insurance Girl' anymore for old-times sake. Maybe she was being silly. To think that for some reason, _she_ was extra-special to Vash.

Sighing, she wiped the little tears out of her eyes, frustrated and mad at herself for losing it momentarily. She started to tell herself that she didn't really care. It was a beautiful Saturday afternoon, and she was going to enjoy it, damn it! He wasn't going to ruin HER day!

Defying the heat, she stood up and stretched, listening to every bone in her back pop. She'd go inside, take a long, cool bath with a book...and then start to make dinner. Yes, that's just what she'd do.

Her hand was on the door handle, prepared to go marching in, when she heard something.

A cat meow.

Looking over across the road, she saw a black cat sitting on a trash-can. It was small and alone, but it had a strange fire burning deep within it's eyes.

"Kuroneko." The word parted her lips.

They locked eyes for what seemed like eternity, neither moving a muscle. Meryl's hand still on the handle. A frozen moment in time.

Suddenly, without warning, a dog barked, the cat scampered off, and Meryl jumped, bringing her back to reality. As quickly as it had come, the spell was broken.

She shook her head and shuddered at the strange encounter. What had it been? She looked down at her hand that still hadn't moved from it's place on the doorknob. It was ever so slightly shaking.

The dog continued to bark irritatingly at something in the desert. She lifted her eyes to the dog, and then to what he was focused on.

It brought her eyes back to the desert. Where she saw a tiny figure in the distance.

"No." She stared at it, unable to form a coherent thought.

Without thinking, she turned away from the door and ran down the front steps and looked out to the edge of town. Meryl looked harder at the figure out in the sand. Was it a mirage? No. It was real. No mirages lasted this long...and they rarely _moved!_

All at once she wanted to shout out his name, wanted to go get Milly and tell her, wanted to leap for joy. But something inside her refused to take her eyes off the tall person in the distance. That somehow if she looked away now, he would be gone with the sand.

She caught her breath.

She thought her heart would explode.

_Oh you better not be kidding me. It better be him._

_*********_

He had stopped singing. He could barely swallow. He wasn't sure what to do, because as always he hadn't thought these things through well enough. But he did know one thing. Water was at the top of his list. His brother had never felt heavier. Even heavier than that cross...

_Nice one, Wolfwood,_ He thought. _Giving me your cross to bear, eh?_ Those were his last coherent thoughts before he completely lost consciousness.

The Stampede stepped into the city limits, and promptly fell over, tumbling to the ground, brother and all.

**********


	2. Homecoming

From afar, Meryl watched as Vash fell. Her eyes widened as she noticed something about his size land on top of him...something he had been carrying. She squinted to try and make it out. It didn't look like the Punisher Cross he had left with, but more like another man. Vash had carried someone over his shoulder the entire trek back, all the while on foot?

It occurred to her that he would need her help. Every thought in her brain was backing up. She realized how naked she felt with her limited attire and no guns. Never mind that, she thought.

Breaking into a run, she raced to the edge of town.

There he was, lying on the ground in the sand. The person she had seen him topple over with was a man bearing a striking resemblance to Vash. This must be Knives, she reasoned. But why on earth would Vash have brought him back to endanger more people?

Pushing those thoughts aside, she dropped to her knees next to Vash, gently guiding his head up onto her lap. She pushed his brother over onto the sand, mindful to not hurt him. Tenderly opening one of his eye lids with her thumb and forefinger, she tentatively peered into the aqua depths. They looked tired and glassy from dehydration, unaware of anything.

"Oh, Vash."

Everything had gone so quick. She hadn't even had a chance to realize that he was back!

Stronger than she looked, she worked on pulling more of him upon her lap, and hugging him tight, wondering if she'd ever be able to let go. In a sudden outburst of emotion, she broke into tears and began to smile, pressing her face into his limp, sweaty hair. His perfectly gelled spikes had long expired from the heat. He stirred a little, one eye opening slowly to look at her.

Lifting up his arm, he brushed a stray lock of hair out of her face.

Gasping in relief, she let her questions spill out:

"Vash? Can you hear me? Are you hurt? Can you move you legs-"

His first and only delirious thought was to figure out why Meryl was crying. And then stop it. The best way, his mind reasoned, was to silence the short woman. Painfully scooting up on one elbow, he leaned in and kissed her gently on the mouth, then pressed his forehead to hers.

"Why...why don't you get Milly. She can carry Knives. He...he needs a doctor. Dontlethimhurtanybody...."

Exhausted by the effort of speaking, He once more passed out.

***

He was standing in the control room of the SEEDS ship. No machinery hummed, no people spoke. The place was deserted and cold.

Panicked, he looked out of a nearby porthole. Black. Empty, black space.

Then footsteps.

Coming closer.

His eyes widened as he looked up and down the main console for somewhere to tuck away. But there was nowhere to hide. Nowhere to run.

Footfalls getting louder.

Backing into a corner, he began to whimper, unable to close his terrified eyes.

As the person rounded the corner, every muscle in his body went slack. It was only Rem!

"Rem!"

But as the words left his mouth, he suddenly knew that something was wrong. She looked like herself...but it wasn't her. Her pupils widened to encompass her whole eyes. Then they went jet black, a demented smile on her lips. Her mouth opened, and she spoke. It was not her own sweet voice, but his brothers.

"You KILLED me!"

"KNIVES! NO!"

***

Vash sat bolt upright in bed, clutching at his head and bandaged shoulder in pain.

The first thing he noticed was Meryl sitting at his bedside. She had a perplexed and frightened look on her face.

"Vash? What is it? You-"

He swiftly cut her off.

"Is he ok? Is Knives ok? I didn't kill him, did I? She wouldn't have wanted that! Oh god, tell me that I didn't KILL HIM!?"

Her features relaxed slightly, but retained a worried expression. "He'll be ok. Don't worry, you didn't kill him. He's downstairs on the couch...he hasn't come around yet, but the doctor said he wouldn't, for a few days at least."

She paused and looked at the man sitting on the bed. He looked like a frightened child.

"I---we were worried about you."

She paused again, wishing he would say something, intensely curious, but not wanting to pry. After a few seconds of silence, her curiosity got the better of her. "What was your dream--"

"My Mother," He interrupted. He paused with the pain. "I dreamt about my mother. Knives..." He swallowed and closed his eyes. "Knives killed her."

Meryl's eyes went wide and sympathetic at the facts she already knew. He had told her about Rem, and about what Knives had done before, that had been when he had asked her not to follow him. When she had first discovered who Knives really was. It was her main reason she feared the blond man in the living room, and avoided him at all costs. "I'm...I'm so sorry", was all she could think to say.

"She loved Knives; She wouldn't have wanted me to kill him."

He looked down at his prosthetic arm.

"So I didn't."

Feeling awkward, Meryl came over and sat by his feet on the bed. "You did the right thing, Vash."

They both looked down at their hands, an uncomfortable silence between them.

Gradually a puzzled look appeared on his face. "How long have I been back?", He asked.

"What exactly happened? And, come to think of it-", -Here he looked at down at himself- "Where're my clothes?"

At the three questions, Meryl started to feel the old urge to club him in the head creep up on her, but resisted.

"They're downstairs. In the living room, with your brother."

"Oh. Back up- We're in a house? Whose?" He didn't recognize it as the one he had left some weeks earlier.

"Well...technically my name is on the deed, but Milly paid for it, mostly. Oh, she struck water, by the way. And then we had quite a bit of extra money...so here we are." She fiddled with the bow on her shirt.

"We both agreed that you should have this room." She bit her lip. "That is, if you want to stay now." She felt a strange sense of deja-vu as she said that, and she knew she had said it before, right before he had left. 'See how far that got me', She thought to herself.

"I don't know yet." He swung his legs over the edge of the bed, wondering who had dressed him into his pajamas. Cracking his neck, he muttered something about seeing his brother, and slid off the bed. "On second thought," He asked, "Where's the bathroom?"

***

Milly pulled the thermometer out of her sleeping patient's mouth and stared at it for a full minute. Satisfied, she laid it down on the coffee table, and sat in a nearby chair. Opening up the local newspaper, she began to talk at the slumbering invalid.

"Now Mr. Knives, let me read you some of today's news since you've kinda been out of touch with the real world lately. Oooh, let me see here..."

"Sand-steamer holdup, 3 towns over! Locals say it's the worst robbery they've had in years!"

"That sounds exciting." Sighing, she set down her paper and gazed out the window.

"Mr Knives, it's really nice to lead a normal life for once. But I for one, really miss using my gun. When every thing's so peaceful and nice, I start to think, and that doesn't make me very happy. I don't like to think bout things like Miss Meryl does. She likes to think about - MISTER VASH!"

One look at the man on the landing, and Milly jumped up from her chair, scattering the newspapers all over the floor. More agile than she looked, she swooped over to where Vash was standing, and proceeded to give him a bone-crushingly big hug.

After a few seconds of torture, she released him.

"We've been worried SICK about you! We thought you'd never wake up!"

He just rubbed the back of his head and smiled at Milly, not saying anything. "I suppose you want to see Mister Knives, huh?" He nodded and strode past her down the stars to the living room.

Seeing his brother like that was hard. His hair was messy and damp, with a light sheen of sweat covering his face.

"A doctor's been here?", He asked.

"Oh, yeah! Don't worry, he'll be okay." Somehow, Vash didn't look particularly worried.

"Vash, you must be starved." Meryl had descended the flight of stairs, and was heading for the kitchen. After one last glance at his brother, he followed quietly behind her into the kitchen.

Milly, discerning person that she was, kept out.

***


	3. Like Old Times

**Incredibly short chapter, but I really feel bad for leaving all of my readers hanging...so here you are, a great big piece of fluff. :) Thanks go out to 'Luv4Uncas' for that encouraging PM. :) Hopefully someday I'll be able to put together an actual plot for this story...till then!**

**Blaidd.**

**-Enjoy!**

********

The kitchen was large enough to hold several people, and not much else. It was Meryl-size, Vash reflected.

The little woman scurried through the contents of the cupboard, looking for anything edible. She soon came upon a problem. Even standing on a stool on her very tipi-toes, she couldn't reach the top shelf.

"Here, let me help. What do you need?"

"Oh! I didn't realized you were in here. Um...well, I could use that flour on the top shelf. If you don't mind getting it, that is."

"Not at all." He reached across her, picking it easily up from off the shelf. She blushed without thinking. He had obviously cleaned himself up. His hair was back into it's classic shape, and his face was glowing and clean. And...what was that smell...? She sniffed before cautiously asking,

"Vash... are you wearing my deodorant?"

"Yeah, why?"

"Uh...oh, never mind." She smiled a little, baffled at his ignorance of the way things worked.

"Why?" He asked again.

"No, no, it's fine...it's just, that's women's deodorant..."

"Oh. Is that bad?" He tilted his head slightly, looking genuinely puzzled.

"How old are you, again?" She laughed before he could give her an answer. "It's okay, Vash, that's a rhetorical question."

He set the bag of flour in her arms and smiled at her, obviously confused.

There was an awkward silence, before Meryl set the bag on the counter, opened it, and started measuring some of the flour into a large bowl. As she worked, she began to talk. "Um, I know it's none of my business, but what are you going to do now?" She swallowed, wondering if that it was the right thing to say.

"I haven't made my mind up." He smiled to make up for his vague words, innocently scratching the back of his head.

"I guess I didn't expect you to say anything different." She lowered her head a little, staring intently at the flour bowl, as it were the most important thing on the planet. She murmured a curse as a tear fell into the dry flour, making it sticky.

"Why is what I do so important to you?" He moved closer, lightly setting a hand on her shoulder.

It was met by a forceful slap across the mouth, and a suddenly angry Meryl.

"Why? WHY? You are our LIFE! We...we...you...we STAY with you! You're our...our...WARD! Why? Why? Why...."

She stood her ground the cramped kitchen, brandishing her mixing spoon, face streaked in flour, hands covered. Her defenses were crumbling, as the tears ran over her face, blurring her world. They finally left her altogether, and she stepped forward, welcoming comfort.

"You're...getting me...wet," He laughed softly as she bawled into his shirt. He was answered by a sharp punch to the gut.

***


	4. Voices

**I'm made some decisions, dear readers, and I've come to a slightly sad conclusion: I cannot write a plot for this. It's just not coming. Everything I can think of has been done to death, in much better prose than my own. Do not fret! I will continue this. But please, don't look for plot. It may seem to be there, but it lies. :) Instead, this will be more Drabble-y and laid back, with very little conflict. Right now I'm still setting up the premise, basically, but things will become much shorter from here on out. :) I hope to doesn't disappoint you too much, but it's just the way things have to be. I hope you continue to read, though, and I look forward to future reviews. :)**

Five days had passed since Vash and his brother's return. Nothing had changed, really, but nothing was the same. The recent heat wave had gone back to the hellish place it came from, but the still-hot air ruffled everyone's sunburned skin. Tension ran high, and livestock deaths were finally be tallied.

This particular day was significant. Today, someone in a long slumber awoke.

The world was a mottled grey color. No,- More of a _sensation _than a color. _A grey sensation..._

Someone was humming. Not very loud, but more within themselves. It wasn't happy, though. The thing that was humming, that is. It was miserable. Trying to be happy.

The corner of a mouth went up, characteristically. The thing that was humming was lying to everyone, including itself. That was very, _very_ amusing.

Knives lay inside himself for several hours. He was finally at least semi-conscious, and was busying himself with taking stock of the damage to his body, and mending it. When he tired of the concentration of healing, he was amused with the thoughts of what he could now positively identify as a human. It was female. Not that he cared. He hadn't the strength to scan her memories to find how she was connected to his brother, but he knew she was. And he would be sure to kill her as soon as he could.

Actually, he didn't have strength for much. Three emotions dominated all others: Pain. Rage. Amusement. He wasn't quite sure why he was amused, but he reasoned that he must be drugged with something- something that he would fight as soon as he could. At the moment however, he could feel it keep his pain at bay. And that wasn't at all unpleasant. It was impairing his thinking processes, however. Waves of fondness kept washing over him. Fondness for no one in particular, just a general love for the world...What was he _thinking?_

The feelings of fondness quickly evaporated into panic and loathing, mixing into a terrible combination. Who had drugged him? Why? Where were they, so he could quickly_ rip their throats out? _

He breathed heavily for some time, until the panic and rage subsided, forcing himself to think. _Think. Think. Think. Think..._

He passed out.

Milly paused from her quiet humming to look closely at her patient. "Mr. Knives?" She asked softly, standing up and craning over his still body. But the change in his breathing that had alerted her fell back into a a steady, rhythmic pattern, and she sat back in her chair. She smiled at him, beaming all sorts of happy thoughts in his direction. It helped her stay positive, but she could feel her mask slipping now and again. _'Nothing ever good comes from dwelling on sad things, Milly', _she scolded herself. '_Besides, Mr. Knives and Mr. Vash and all the orphans need your help. What do you think you're going to do with yourself if you're a gloomy-puss all the time?'_

It was hard. So very hard. As much as she wanted to help everyone, and be happy, there was another little voice in the back of her head, the one that whispered, _'You're helping the man that ordered Nicholas killed? You're going to let him live? You have everything you could ever want to make his life end. No one would even have to know'_

"I WOULD KNOW!" Milly stood, quivering, little tears of frustration and sadness welling out her large, blue eyes. "There's always another way," she said to no one in particular, in a slightly steadier voice.

_**I would know. **_

She wiped her eyes on her sleeve, and sat back down.

**I vote Milly as the person most in need of a therapist in the Trigun universe! Poor girl.**

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